Lifting the arms of a handcuffed man up behind his back while tripping him facefirst onto a concrete cell-block floor causing skull fracture and permanent brain damage is "more force than was necessary" but not "police brutality", concluded Robert Hutchison, retired B.C. Supreme Court Justice acting as adjudicator for the B.C. Police Complaint Commission, "reluctantly" yesterday.

Not that jail shouldn't be feared, but the fact is, so many activists and everyday people before me swallowed those fears and walked facefirst into the fire. 40 years later, I sit here reaping the benefits.